Happy Valley Insider - Penn State Football Countdown to Kickoff: No. 42 DE Mason Robinson
Only 42 days remain until Penn State's 2024 season begins on August 31.
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Football Penn State Football Countdown to Kickoff: No. 42 DE Mason Robinson
- Thread starter Richie O
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6'3 245 now. Be interesting to see how DE depth shakes out behind the 4 projected starters (DDS, Carter, Vanover, Lyons).
He will probably see more PT as the season progresses to help the primary four stay fresh and prep him for a possible starting role in 2025.
I figure at least 2 of the young DEs will see some playing time for a rotation of 6. Harvey, Mupoyi, and Williams are the 3 other young players along with Vilbert, who is listed as a DE, but weights 290 now. Then we have Andrew's, who is listed as a DT, but weighs 260.
I wonder if Andrews is still being groomed for DT or stay around current weight and play DE?
I am inclined to believe he's going to be a DE. He didn't have a lot of bad weight on him the best I could tell, but the shed to 260 seems like future DE more than future DT.
Lyons pulled ahead of Robinson and Mupoyi last season as all 3 are the '23 class yet only Lyons saw PT and the other two were redshirted. So if Lyons is 2nd team then for #5 and #6 you have Robinson and Mupoyi and Vilbert. Mupoyi was the highest rated coming out of HS between Lyons, Robinson and Mupoyi (Mupoyi #21, Lyons #28, Robinson #33 for their position per Rivals. He has great size at 6'6". Not sure if any of the '24 class can come in and get ahead of Robinson or Mupoyi. Williams was the highest rated at #18.
Current weight? The psu roster showing 260 lbs is not necessarily accurate on player weights. I'd put my money on Andrews being 280+ lbs by the end of August, but there is no good reason to play him beyond the allowed 4 games. And he may not even play that much as the competition to get any game snaps at DT among the 4 freshman DT's will be stiff, behind Ellies, Durant, Izzard, Beamon, Ford, Artis and Blanding.
But if one of the true freshman, Andrews, Cunningham, Gilliam or Cook, excels in Fall practice, Barnes could try and work him in to utilize the 4 games to prepare him for a large role in 2025. As settled as DT seems to be for 2024, following the position battles going into 2025 will be much more interesting.
It seems that DT will be a pretty boring position to watch as far a young players go in 2024 with all the experience and depth returning. But an injury or two, even for a few games, could give us a glimpse of the future at the position.
With the staff only looking for 1 DT in the 2025 class they may already have a positive impression of the 4 true freshmen that are on campus.
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We need some of the young DT guys to play this year to get experience given how much we lose after this season. Andrews was an OT but got recruited for defense. I think he will be a DT like you say. He was a big time recruit so it will be fun to see how he develops.
Just like at DT, it will be very hard for a true freshman DE to get any playing time in 2024 except in garbage time, baring significant injuries. DDS, Carter, Vanover, Lyons and Vilbert, and then Robinson, Mupoyi and Mayer the transfer from Wisky(?). Just no real need to play the true freshmen and the 3 reshirt freshmen need snaps to get ready for larger roles in 2025.
One of the most interesting things for me to watch will be how Barnes uses Vilbert, with rumors that he will play some DE but also move inside some on obvious pass alignments.
Yep, but the other 3 true freshmen DT's seem very talented as well. And a couple of them seem to have gotten to DT size a little ahead of Andrews - Gilliam listed at 306 lbs for example. Will be fun to see how all the young DL talent progresses this season, next off season, and then early in the 2025 season.
For the '25 DTs we only have Adirika. What I don't get about him is the discrepancy in his ratings between Rivals and 247. Rivals has him #132 nationally, #6 DT overall but 247 has him as an 86 rating, 3 star and actually the lowest rated recruit in our class.
Like you say the '24 class of DTs is solid but if we only get Andirika in '25 then '26 is really important to get DTs. At a quick glance the PA '26 DT talent does not seem that strong.
If Barnes and Allen like a DL I don't put much stock in the ratings. Another factor is that the staff identified Adirika early and has been on him for a good while.
If the four 2024 DT's turn out to all be contributors they will likely form the nucleus of the DT talent at PSU for 3 or 4 years. Not too many DT's leave early for the NFLso if PSU gets a good group it can stabilize the position longer than other positions such as WR and even DE. That's pretty much what happened with this seasons upper classmen DT's.
We lost out to Ohio State for Jarquez Carter, '25 DT committed to them a couple days ago. Not sure there are any more DTs we are going after for '25.
I agree the '24 guys will form a solid nucleus. Need to get them some experience. We lose so much after this year. Have hopes that Kaleb Artis can come on strong and play this year and be a big contributor in '25.
Artis certainly has the size. Any insight on what is holding him back from more PT - strength, technique, lack of quickness?
The upper classmen ahead of him seem to be what has kept him off the field. And that's likely to continue this season as well, although all the practice and the snaps Artis gets should prepare him for a big role in 2025.
All the reports are that Artis will be a big part of the 2025 2 deep. The player I'll be looking for information on his progress in preseason camp is Blanding. If he makes progress towards playing time he could be in the 2 deep for 2025. But with what seems like a load of DT talent in the 2024 DT class there will be significant competition for playing time in 2025 among all the young DT's if they all return for 2025. Also, it wouldn't be a surprise to see Barnes go after an experienced DT in the transfer portal after the 2024 season.
That is the issue. What is the plan for him? He didn't seem like a guy who needed to shed weight.
Cunningham, for example, she'd weight during the winter workouts then put some back on during the last weight announcement (which is where the Andrew's 260 came from).
If he's back up during fall camp, he's very likely a DT. If he's close to 260, I'm leaning towards him becoming a DE.
